Monthly Archives: October 2013

Not a lot to talk about today as one disappears from the records, one dies as a baby and two are too recent for me to detail.

30 October 1850
Birth of Agnes Morgan at Cruden, daughter of Arthur Morgan and Catherine Kilgour Adam, and granddaughter of my ggggg aunt Isabel Sangster and Peter Morgan. Unfortunately I’ve not traced her beyond the 1861 census, when she was at school and living with her widowed mother and younger siblings.

30 October 1897
Baptism of Walter Fletcher at Royston, Yorkshire, son of my gg aunt Annie Senior and coal miner John Fletcher. Little Walter died at 2 months old and was buried at St John the Baptist, Royston.

30 October 1926
Birth of a Fraser granddaughter of my half gg aunt Margaret Fraser, via her son Alexander Mitchell Fraser and Ethel Willox. As I’m not sure whether the granddaughter is still with us or not I’m not revealing her name just in case.

Just one today – but an interesting one as the research involved quite a bit of thinking it all through and looking for connections (and also the spending of credits on ScotlandsPeople).

29 October 1813
Baptism of Mary Ann Morgan at Longside, daughter of Peter Morgan and Isobel Sangster. Her mother was the sister of my gggg grandmother Janet Sangster. Mary Ann gave birth to two illegitimate children: Barbara Sangster in 1832 (father George Sangster) and Joseph Mess Greig in 1837 (father James Greig). On both baptism entries Mary Ann Morgan is said to be of Kinmundy, which is where some of the Sangster and Morgan families lived. There is then an entry for the reading of banns for Mary Ann Morgan and David Young at Slains in November 1840: their marriage entry is quite unusual as it seems to read as if they had the banns read at Slains but were married elsewhere, though there is no other marriage entry in the OPRs. And to further complicate things, their eldest child had been baptised at Longside in October 1840. David Young was a riddle and beehive maker, and his mother was Margaret Sangster, so perhaps Mary Ann was related to him (and she may also have been related to the George Sangster who father her daughter Barbara). David Young and wife Mary are in Longside in 1841 with a baby son. In 1841 Mary Ann’s daughter Barbara is with her great aunt Barbara Sangster ar Brunthill, Cruden, which is where Mary Ann’s mother Isobel Sangster was born, but there is no trace of Joseph Greig, who may have died in infancy. In 1851 David and Mary Ann Young are in Old Machar with 4 children, and are in Old Deer in 1861 with their 4 youngest children, the eldest having died or working away from home. David Young died in 1863 at Stuartfield, Old Deer, and in 1871 Mary Young, annuitant, is at Main Street, Old Deer with her youngest daughter and a granddaughter. She is in Longside in 1881 with her son Duncan, a baker, and a different granddaughter. Mary Ann Young died in 1887 at Peterhead, widow of David Young beehive maker. Her son Duncan was a baker in Peterhead so she may have been living with him, but the informant was her son David Young. He gave her father as George Morgan and mother unknown, but Mary Ann’s parents died before 1841 so he would not have known them, and given all the other evidence I think it’s highly likely he made a mistake with Mary Ann’s father’s name.

I’ve finally pulled together information about my Logan ancestors, from Aberdeenshire – not to be confused with my Logan ancestors from Ayrshire. There is now a Logan page (see tabs above) and under the tab is the link to the page which details my Logan family tree as so far researched.

There’s been a very severe storm overnight, down south, but Yorkshire has escaped and we only had some heavy rain. Yesterday’s and today’s ancestors are a Neilson who might be my gggg grandfather, a Hunter from Ayrshire who may, or may not, have been the wife of Allan Sym, a Haddow ancestor who probably died young, a Strachan who migrated to USA and settled in Braceville, and a Strachan descendant who married her cousin and migrated to USA and lived in Oliphant.

28 October 1744
Walter Neilson, who I think could have been my gggg grandfather, was baptised at Govan, son of Walter Neilson and Mary Berrie. There is a marriage for Walter Neilson and Agnes Hadden at Glasgow in 1765 and they had 10 children between 1766 and 1790, all born in Govan or Gorbals except, intriguingly, one born in 1780 in Irvine – which means the family may have met the Strachans in Ayrshire before the Strachans moved to Gorbals. There are several deaths in the Gorbals OPR for a Walter Neilson of about the right age between 1835 and 1848 and it’s impossible to know which, if any, is the correct one. His daughter Agnes Neilson, born in 1771, married John Strachan.

27 October 1777
Birth of my gggg aunt Ann Hunter at Stevenston, Ayrshire, aughter of John Hunter and Margaret Barr. I suspect she is the Ann Hunter who married Allan Sym (or Sim or Syme) in Stevenston in 1805. They had 6 children baptised in Stevenston, Ayr, St Quivox and the Stevenston again, between 1805 and 1816. In the 1819 Minister’s Census of Stevenston there is an Alan Sim collier with wife Ann Hunter at Townhead, with 7 children, though they are not in 1822 census. The 1841 census has Ann Syme age 60 living at Doura, Kilwinning with Allan Syme age 20 and what looks like 3 lodgers (ages were rounded down in 1841 census), and again at Doura in 1851 age 74, pauper coal miner’s wife born Stevenston, with a grandson. There is a death for Ann Syme age 84 at Irvine in 1861, widow of a coal miner: the informant is her daughter Ann McIntyre who has given the name William Hunter as Ann Syme nee Hunter’s father, and no name for the mother. But although there were two William Hunters having children at about the right time in Stevenston, there is no record of a daughter Ann. I can’t help wondering if the father’s name on Ann Syme nee Hunter’s death certificate is a mistake, especially given that Ann Syme’s eldest daughter was named Margaret, the name of “my” Ann Hunter’s mother. The William Hunters in Stevenston had wives called Jane or Mary, and Ann Syme nee Hunter didn’t call any of her daughters Jane or Mary. So it’s possible, but not proven, that Ann Syme, is “my” Ann Hunter.

28 October 1825
Birth of my gg aunt Jane Wilson Haddow at Stevenston, daughter of coal miner John Haddow and Amelia Murphie. I suspect she died young, as there was another daughter called Wilson and another called Jean, and Jane Wilson Haddow is not with her parents in 1841. A lot of trees on Ancestry have her as married to Joseph Strachan but she wasn’t: Joseph’s wife was her younger sister Jean Haddow born in about 1834.

28 October 1857
Birth of Jean Strachan at Dreghorn, daughter of John Strachan and Margaret Lambie and granddaughter of gggg uncle Robert Strachan and Jean Kelly. She is with her parents in Dreghorn in 1861 and 1871, and by age 13 was earning her keep as a bonnet knitter. She married coal miner Samuel Miller in Dreghorn in December 1874 and they are in the 1881 census at Kirkland Row, Dreghorn with a baby daughter. Later that year they migrated to USA and settled in Coal City, Braceville, Illinois. Samuel Miller died there in 1894, and Jean is in the 1900 census, which says she has had 8 children, 6 living. 5 of her children are still at gome, the eldest a teach and the rest at school, and Jean is working as a school janitor. She has two daughters with her in 1910, one a teacher. Her teach daughter is still with her in 1930, but in Jean Miller is still at the same house on South Broadway, Coal City, age 81 and on her own. She died in May 1942 and was buried at Braceville.

27 October 1889 (born about 1876)
Agnes Leggat was born in 1876 at Kilmarnock, Ayrshire according to her census entries, the daughter of William Leggat and Susan Strachan Holland, and was a great granddaughter of gggg uncle Peter Strachan and Mary Monroe. Her parents moved to Greenock, Renfrewshire not long after Anges’s birth, as the family is there in 1881 and 1891: Agnes’s father was a railway car inspector. Her mother died in 1898, and in 1899 Agnes married coal miner Robert Muir, the son of her mother’s sister Mary Holland. They had a civil wedding as they were married by declaration in Greenock Registry Office by Warrant of the Sheriff. Robert Muir had already spent some years in USA, and in December 1906 he, Agnes and their 2 children sailed to New York. Robert Holland Muir was naturalised in 1915, and his papers list wife Agnes born in Kilmarnock. Agnes is with her husband and children in Oliphant, Pennsylvania in 1920, 1930 and 1940: she had 5 children but 2 did not survive childhood.

Today’s three includes an early Fraser from Cruden and Peterhead, a Strachan who was a coal miner and in Kilwinning, Dreghorn and Auchinleck, and a Green descendent from Yorkshire who was also a coal miner.

26 October 1772
Baptism of Andrew Fraser at Cruden, son of Donald Frazer and Margaret. He’s my ggggg uncle if Im right about the identity of the father of William Fraser born 1805. Andrew Fraser married Jean Walker in 1799 at Cruden, and in 1841 is an ag lab living at Brickworks, Peterhead with his wife, a daughter, two grandchildren and two of his brother, John and William. it’s William who I think father my ggg grandfather. In 1851 Andrew, age 78, is at the same address with his daughter, 2 nieces, a nephew, a grandchild and his brother William. He died before 1855.

26 October 1840
Birth of my gg uncle John Strachan at Shewalton Colliery, Ayrshire, son of Robert Strachan and Margaret Haggerty. He’s with his parents in 1841, then they moved to Kilwinning, his mother died and his father remarried, to Susan Cran, and in 1851 John is with his family at Moncur Row, Kilwinning. He became a coal miner – of course – and in 1861 is living with the Muir family in Kilwinning – they were probably relations of his future wife, as later that year he married Jane Muir, domestic servant of Kilwinning. In 1871 John and Jane are at Burn Row, Kilwinning with 4 children, and in 1881 are at Southoak Row, Dreghorn with 7 children. They’re still there in 1891, with only 2 children at home, but had relations nearby as Southoak Row crops up fiarly often on my Strachan family tree. By 1901, however, they moved down to Auchinleck and may have have also lived in Stair, where their illegitimate grandson was born in 1895. In the 1901 census John, age 61, is retired, and they have 2 working children and their grandson with them. John Strachan died in Auchinleck in 1902 at age 63.

26 October 1862
Baptism of Benjamin Schofield at Worsbrough, son of my ggg aunt Ann Green and John Schofield. Benjamin is with his parents and siblings in Worsbrough, his father working as a coal miner. His mother died in 1880, and in 1881 he is with his father, who is now a farmer, and Benjamin is working as a butcher. He married Ada Ward in December 1890 at Worsbrough, and in 1891 they are at West Bank, Nether Hoyland, Benajmin working as a colliery labourer. There is a death for a Benjamin Schofield in 1898 registered at Barnsley which I strongly suspect is him, but I’ve not been able to trace his wife or, if they had any, their children.

25 October 1860
Birth of Agnes Strachan Muir at Riccarton, daughter of John Muir and Mary Holland and great granddaughter of gggg uncle Peter Strachan and Mary Monroe (aka they who spawned an enormous family). Agnes died in November 1868 and her death was registered at Stockton in England. In 1871 her family were in Northumberland, then went to Cumberland, and then migrated to Canada.

Thank you to those who sent birthday greeting for me yesterday via the blog and via email. I had a lovely day and your wishes made it even lovelier. Today there are two what-the-heck-became-of-them people, and a cousin’s daughter.

24 October 1804
Baptism of my gggg aunt Mary Green at Worsbrough, Yorkshire, daughter of linen bleacher Joseph Green and Ann Cox. Unfortunately she had a very common name, and none of the records appear to be of her. There is a marriage of a Mary Green in 1823 at the neighbouring parish of Darfield to Thomas Hawcroft but I suspect it is not.

24 October 1870
Birth of Jane Brydon Strachan at Dreghorn, daughter of John Strachan and Agnes Scott and granddaughter of my ggg uncle Munro Strachan and Janet Jamieson. She is with her parents in Dreghonr in 1871 and 1881, but from there on is a bit of mystery. There are trees on Ancestry with conflicting information about her marriage and her death, none of which I can verify without spending a small fortune on ScotlandsPeople.

24 October 1980
Birth of a cousin’s daughter here in Leeds, descended from James Fraser and Clara Green.

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